TRENTON — Mayor Tony Mack on Thursday declared the buck stops with him as he abolished the city’s longstanding practice of giving taxpayer money to recreation organizations without a contract.

Effective immediately, all athletic leagues will be required to sign contracts with the city in order to receive any funding, according to Mack’s office. Any recreation organization seeking city funds will also be required to submit financial statements and other information.

Mack announced the new policy in response to criticism he received from City Council members and other members of the public who have said the administration needs to have official contracts — not informal agreements or verbal understandings — with any group that receives city funds.

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“We’re not opposed to doing a contract with the city at all,” said Bernice A. Mitchell-White, club administrator of the nonprofit Trenton Track Club. “We would just like to be compensated and we will do a contract. ... What we’ve informally done already will be in writing. The track club is not opposed to it. We welcome it. If it’s helpful to the city, we’re fine with that. In the end, it will benefit our athletes.”

The city has long given funds to recreation organizations without official contracts. Multiple athletic organizations like the Trenton Track Club are waiting to receive city funds for services they’ve provided to city youths.

City Business Administrator Sam Hutchinson earlier this week said he’s holding off on paying those vendors until he gets documentation verifying those groups provided recreation services that the city agreed to fund.

Mitchell-White said the Trenton Track Club has long had “an informal standing agreement for years now. It’s gone through all four of the mayors,” she said, referring to Mack and former mayors Douglas Palmer, Carmen Armenti and Arthur Holland. “We’ve never had to do anything in writing, but we’ve met with each mayor.”

Under Mack’s term, Trenton City Hall has been raided by FBI agents seeking evidence of corruption, and the city’s Department of Recreation, Natural Resources and Culture has been shaken by leadership instability and a deficit created by poor budgeting practices.

The Trenton Track Club has helped produce track stars like Trenton High’s Jermaine Collier, who dominated at the 2012 Meet of Champions, becoming only the second boy in state history to win both the 110m and 400m hurdles.

Ten-year-old Athing Mu, a fifth-grader in the Trenton public schools, is also a star prodigy of the Trenton Track Club, with her setting records in the AAU Nationals that include running the 1500m in 5 minutes and 3 seconds.

Mitchell-White declined to say how much the city owes the Trenton Track Club. She said she understands why the Mack administration is holding off on paying recreation vendors, but she said it’s the track club’s hope that the administration in the next week makes those payments so the vendors can be compensated for services that have already been provided.

“His kids have run in our club even before he became mayor, so I know it’s not a personal thing,” Mitchell-White said of Mack on the funding issue. “The city is under a microscope. I don’t want it to be lost that the kids are the ones that are hurting.”

On an annual basis, more than 1,000 Trenton youth participate in basketball, track, football, soccer and baseball leagues, according to Mack’s office, which said, “The city is not in a position, financially, to hire personnel to run these leagues. Therefore, we contribute a nominal dollar amount to many of these leagues.”

“Furthermore, we will not allow political theater or our fiscal climate to endanger opportunities our children have available to them,” Mack said.

In a press release, the mayor’s office said the new changes to recreation funding “will produce a more accountable and transparent process.” The press release didn’t say anything to address recent reports of City Hall’s bidding practices.

George Dougherty, a former city attorney, said he believes the Mack administration violated state bidding law by providing recreation funds to former NBA player Greg Grant without a formal bid process or City Council approval.

City activist Michael Walker on Thursday rejected Mack’s new funding policy as a “phony” initiative. “I think the attempt by the mayor is a thinly veiled, too-little-too-late action to try to essentially fool Trentonians into believing that he is going to contract with vendors and pay vendors in a legal way,” Walker said.

“I think it’s phony, and I don’t think Trentonians are going to fall for it. This is a mayor who needed to be proactive, not reactive.”

The mayor defended the city’s Recreation Department and said the city needs to promote recreational activities as a necessary component to making Trenton a safer city.

“There is a myth in our community that successful crime prevention only requires the strengthening or creation of new laws and/or hiring more police officers,” Mack said. “While we support strong laws and a robust police presence, we know that creating structured environments for our children, day in day out, will go a long way to reducing crime.”